Senator Cardozo: Senator Gold, you talk about the transformative changes that are taking place in the economy with the environment and with climate change. At the same time, we have soaring inflation, and we have concerns about a recession.

Is this the time to make these investments, or can they not be put off for a few years, as some would argue?

Senator Housakos: My question is a follow-up to Senator Cardozo’s questions.

Senator Manning, as you know, Senator Cardozo makes the parallel between us senators and government officials. We’re not government officials — we’re parliamentarians, for starters. Our role is to keep government officials to account — like the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, or CRTC, and the government.

Your speech touched a lot on fairness and small players, as did the question from Senator Cormier. When we look at the Canada Media Fund, we look at the money they sent to the CBC. In addition to the $1.4 billion, we allow that big player to take — I won’t say steal — advertising money away from competition in the marketplace. Now we have the government who also claims it wants to create a fair, equitable system and help the small operator. The CRTC — these gatekeepers — have approved Rogers buying up Shaw — one giant buying up another giant. How does that sound —

Hon. Andrew Cardozo: My question is for the Government Representative, and it is regarding the budget tabled this week.

Observers are calling this a watershed budget, as it has provided significant support to green technology, taking the Canadian industry up to a new level, in part to keep up with the major incentives provided by the Inflation Reduction Act in the United States and other similar measures in Europe and other countries. There’s a great deal that Canadians can do to advance this industry for domestic purposes and build our international competitiveness in green technology.

Can you outline, Senator Gold, what the government is doing to build this Canadian industry, create jobs and fight climate change?

Senator Cardozo: This is more of a statement just to thank Senator Manning. This will be the first bill that I will be involved in from beginning to end. Like you, I look forward to hearing from the diversity of opinion on this bill, and I’m sure you and I share that view. We’ll look forward to those hearings.

Senator Manning: Thank you. I wasn’t sure if you were answering Senator Cardozo’s question in the beginning or asking me one. Anyway, it was a little bit of both. I wouldn’t want you to be confused.

The bottom line is that we live in a changing world in so many aspects of our world. The media is part of that. When I remember back to when I was growing up, we had one channel in our community — the CBC — and if the weather was bad, you had to go on the roof to fix the rabbit ears to make sure the view came in and wasn’t all snowy on the screen. Access to media is now at your fingertips. Finding some type of regulation to deal with that is in all our best interests, but finding the best legislation to deal with that is in Canadians’ interest. I think that’s where we need to be in relation to the bills. It can’t be Band-Aid solutions. We have to take the whole problem and try to work through it and try to come up with solutions and a piece of legislation that addresses the concerns of all players.

I know the small players in the media are struggling in this country. I don’t have to go any further than Newfoundland and Labrador to see that. I’ve met with those people in some cases. They’re concerned about legislation, but they’re also concerned about their futures, and many of them have closed up shop. We have to try to find a way to protect them but at the same time protect the freedom the media has.

What I said earlier in relation to committee is that we can talk about it here in the chamber and we can talk about it outside, but it’s in committee that the work gets done. It’s in committee that we hear from the witnesses and educate ourselves and, hopefully, through that educational process come up with a piece of legislation that addresses the concerns we all share.